


Just A Load of Hurt/Comfort

by DeathByTeacups



Category: Captain America - All Media Types, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Avengers Family, BAMF Natasha Romanov, Banter, Bucky Barnes Feels, Deaf Clint Barton, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Everyone Needs A Hug, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, I'm Bad At Tagging, Injury, Injury Recovery, Major Character Injury, Multi, Natasha Romanov Is Not A Robot, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, POV Multiple, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Protective Bucky Barnes, Protective Hulk (Marvel), Protective Steve Rogers, Protective Tony Stark, Slow To Update, Team as Family, Whump, Whumptober 2019, Winter Soldier Bucky Barnes, comic book clint barton, just everyone is protective, whump to fluff in two paragraphs flat, writing prompts
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-02
Updated: 2020-06-02
Packaged: 2021-03-03 21:08:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,253
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24502138
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DeathByTeacups/pseuds/DeathByTeacups
Summary: 31 (mostly) one-shots involving Bad Stuff happening to the Avengers, and the team protecting and caring for each other.
Kudos: 13





	1. Shaky hands-- Thor (ft. Clint)

**Shaky hands** _ \-- Thor (ft.Clint) _

_ A run-in with some frost giants leads Thor to his first-ever post-mission panic attack _

The Quinnjet had never been so full of blankets. No one could figure out how Maria had managed to get so many, so quickly, but everyone was grateful. The ambient temperature of the ship was still on the lower side of normal, but Hill had insisted that it was better to raise it slowly rather than all at once. Blankets and warm water (or coffee, for those who wouldn’t drink the water) were the best treatment for hypothermia.

Thor himself didn’t suffer any ill effects of exposure to the elements, but his mortal companions weren’t so fortunate. Tony, Clint, and Natasha were all being pushed to drink as much hot water as they could to raise their temperatures. Even the Hulk was currently buried somewhere underneath a truly impressive pile of quilts, leaving only a few tufts of dark green hair visible. Steve, it seemed, had fared the worst, despite his enhancements, partly from getting too close to the enemy and partly from his own troubles with the cold.

Thor being the only one not suffering hypothermia had two effects, it would seem. For one, it meant that while Hill piloted the Quinjet back to the Tower, she’d put him in charge of fetching hot drinks as the rest of the team needed them, which he was happy to do. One the other hand, it meant that while everyone else spent their time recovering, he was left more or less to his own devices. That one... he was less happy about, though he couldn’t place why. 

It wasn’t even as though he usually minded being left alone. He was a warrior like any other, he’d spent plenty of time on his own before. It was just that he felt uneasy for some reason. Like there was some loose end that he hadn’t taken care of. He knew for a fact the breach had been fully contained, but the feeling didn’t subside. He couldn’t put his finger on it, but something most definitely felt amiss, and his stomach was sitting uncomfortably in his gut over it.

He went over the mission again and again in his head. There’d been a call about strange lights in Norway, a portal had opened and frost giants had spilled into a city street. It had been a hard battle, for frost giants are a formidable enemy even for Asgardians, but his companions had fought well. Just as things looked their bleakest, they’d managed to subdue the giants long enough to close the portal. 

He ran it over in his head again. There had been a lot of them. He was certain none had managed to escape. They’d made well sure that any that hadn’t been beaten back into the portal before it closed were exterminated. The earth was safe, of course.

There’d been a lot of giant blood on the streets afterward. Of course, there were splatters of red, but the vast majority of the streets had been painted blue.

Blue. He ran it over again. He could see it, so clearly in his mind’s eye, blue on the face of a giant, almost too young to be called a man, moments before Thor’s hammer came down on him.

So much blue.

“Hey man.” Clint’s voice broke his thoughts has he shuffled closer, wrapped in three or four heavy blankets, and brandishing his empty mug with a lopsided grin. “I think my cup’s got a hole in it. It just keeps running empty.”

“Oh, yes” Thor murmured absently. “Of course.” He reached out to take the cup from Clint and refill it from the little craft they’d been brewing coffee in for the flight home. The craft shook and sloshed coffee across the sides of the cup, splashing hotly over his fingers. The heat focused him, and he blinked against the strange dissonance in his head. That was odd, there didn’t seem to be much in the way of turbulence. 

“Hey, I thought Asgardians didn’t get cold or something?” Clint asked, passing him the paper towels. 

“I’m not cold,” Thor replied, wiping the cup down and handing it to Clint so that he could wipe down the counter. “I just- I’m just somewhat out of sorts, it would seem.”

Clint gave him a long, unreadable look as he took his mug back, dropping a pair of sugar cubes into it. Thor tried to ignore him, trying to focus on the task at hand so his thoughts wouldn’t slip back to all that blue. 

His mind stuttered over the image again, wide eyes staring up at him as the shadow of his weapon grew.

“Hey!” Clint caught the coffee craft just as it slipped out of Thor’s hands, disturbing his blankets in the process. “Look, man, you’re obviously not okay.” He fitted it back into the machine and resettled his blankets over his shoulders. Then he took Thor’s forearm in his hand, and cold as his fingers were, it was a comfort. “Come sit down with me, okay? Just come chill out a minute.”

Thor went with him willingly enough, finding a seat and strapping in. It wouldn’t be long until they landed anyways, he may as well stay put. Besides, his heart was suddenly hammering in his chest, making his head pulse with an unpleasant heat. He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees and focused on breathing.

A street covered in blue flashed behind his eyes again, and he closed his eyes against the image. He could only see that face still, and his gut twisted painfully at the memory.

He looked down at his hands and found them trembling wildly.

“Hey.” Clint nudged him in the side with his elbow. Thor looked up to find everyone gathering their blankets up and unstrapping from their seats. Had they landed already? He hadn’t noticed, that wasn’t like him at all. How much time had passed since he’d sat down? Clint nudged him again. “Come on, big guy, let’s get inside, yeah?”

Thor followed him absently, pulse still pounding much too fast and his mind buzzing strangely. Everyone was flittering into the common room, talking jovially and bumping shoulders in that way that came after a successful mission, giddy and exhausted in equal measure, but Thor couldn’t seem to find the will to join them. His pulse was rushing in his ears now, that an ominous  _ woosh-woosh _ sound and his lungs felt tight in his chest.

He could still see that face, could still see all that blue blood covering the streets, and that face staring up at him so stricken. Somehow, in the blurred lines of his uncooperative mind, the face started to shift, until it was Loki looking up at him, Loki without whatever magics had kept him looking like an Asgardian their entire lives. Loki, as the frost giant he was, splattered in blood and staring up at him as his hammer came down on him.

Then the hammer came down, and there was nothing but blue.

He couldn’t breathe.

“This way.” Clint shouldered him into a narrow hallway off from the main halls, despite their size difference, and maneuvered him against the wall. Almost before he could process it, he was sliding down to his knees, crumpling in on himself with his hands in his hair. He felt like he couldn’t breathe, like his chest was being crushed in by some force bigger than himself. His face was too hot, for no reason that he could discern, and his mind was nothing but a white haze of terror.

“You’re alright.” Clint’s voice was a cool breeze in the stifling heat of his terror. “Just breathe through it, alright? You’re okay, it’ll pass in a minute. Just focus on breathing. You’re doing fine.”

Eventually, the feeling faded, and Thor managed to slow his breath down enough for his vision to clear. He was pressed against the wall with his knees curled into his chest, and Clint sitting against the wall opposite him still wrapped in his blanket cocoon. He was very careful not to touch him, Thor noticed, keeping his limbs close to him as opposed to his usual sprawl. 

“Thank you.” Thor managed, scrubbing a still faintly trembling hand over his face.

Clint nodded. “That ever happen before?”

“No, never,” Thor replied hurriedly. His hands were still shaking, and he pushed them flat against the ground to stop the tremor. “I’ve fought far more trying battles that this without ever encountering something like this. I don’t even know what happened.”

“It’s called a panic attack, big guy.” Clint grinned grimly at him. “Happens to the best of us. Catches you pretty off-guard usually, too. Any idea what set you off?”

Thor thought it over. In retrospect, it was glaringly obvious. He hadn’t had an encounter with the frost giants since Loki had disappeared, and few since Loki’s true nature had been revealed to them. He should have known with the ever-present worry over his brother that such a gruesome battle against his kind would have upset him on some level.

He looked at Clint, still taking long pulls off his mug. His fingers were ruddy with blotchy patches where the blood was returning to the skin. From where he sat, he the faint tremors chasing their way up and down his frame. Clint had had his own issues with a frost giant in the past, whether or not he knew it. Loki may have been dear to Thor, but there were many to whom he’d been nothing but a bad memory. 

“No,” Thor said. Better not to bring it up. Better not to dig open wounds only just closing for Clint. “I don’t think I do.”

“Hey, that’s alright, buddy.” Clint smiled. “You’ll figure it out. Or you won’t, and you’ll just get blindsided enough to catch the pattern eventually. God knows I’ve been there. Why don’t we go on back out there and get you some coffee, alright?”

Thor nodded, and the two of them rose and made their way back into the common rooms. Steve had changed into his longer, more comfortable sweaters, and Darcy and Pepper appeared to be in the middle of gathering every spare blanket they could find and piling them all atop the Hulk, who lay flat on his back in the middle of the floor. Clint nudged and joked at him, grinning his way into the fray of bodies on the couches, leading him casually into the room without making a scene.

Thor felt the guilt bubble up inside of him as he sat down next to Clint, and at the same moment offered up a prayer that Loki was well.


	2. Explosion-- Bucky + Steve (Ft. Sam + Nat)

**Explosion** \-- _ Bucky + Steve (Ft. Sam + Nat) _

_ Steve’s mission goes pear-shaped, a building explodes, and shit, was that Bucky in there? _

“Cap, can you get to the hard drive from your position?” Sam crackled through Steve’s comm, and Steve looked around him in the hallway. He was six rooms away from the black door the building schematics had listed as the data hub, but there was the sound of boots coming down the hall in that direction. That’d be a delay, but he was fairly certain he could handle it in time. 

“Yeah, I can do that,” Steve replied, sprinting off to meet the oncoming enemies halfway, speeding up the process. “I got some company here but I can handle it. You cover Nat if she needs.”

"Yeah, Nat's gonna need cover." Natasha sounded out of breath, as she seldom ever was even during missions. "I got about a dozen hostiles on my tail right now."

Steve raised his shield under the first barrage of bullets, letting the impacts steady his mind off of Natasha and onto his own situation as he kept moving towards then. One deep breath and he launched himself forward on their reload and slammed the flat of his shield into the first head in front of him, and it was all downhill from there. 

Hostiles dealt with, he continued on until he found the door labeled Data Hub and shut the door behind him. Modern tech was still a little strange looking to him, but after dealing with aliens and all manner of strange things, he was fairly confident in his ability to find an external hard drive in a room full of computers. 

He'd only just located it and the central computer it was attached to when there was the sound of movement down the hallway. He sighed, prepping the flash drive Natasha had given him, preparing himself for another battle while the hard drive downloaded its contents. 

Sounds of a scuffle caught him off guard, however. He plugged the flash drive in and angled himself to face the door, unsure of what might walk through. It was possible whoever was outside the door wouldn't know he was inside and simply bypass him, (the best outcome, he thought) but he'd rather they didn't so he could at least get an idea of whether it was something he needed to comm in to Natasha and Sam.

The scuffle resolved with a heavy thud against the door and a low groan, and then there was only one set of steps in the hall. Steve paid close attention, keeping one eye on the drive and the other on the door, ready for anything. Heavy, measured footfalls made their way slowly to the door, and the body Steve assumed was still slumped against the door slid away. 

When the door opened, all Steve could make out was a dark shape. A large, broad dark shape, presumably male, nearly six feet tall. All dressed in black leather, he noticed, and as he stepped forward the sparse light in the from the computers bounced off his left arm. His metal left arm.

Steve went still in shock, flash drive momentarily forgotten as he took in the Winter Soldier. He hadn't seen Bucky since the fight on the Triskelion, but his appearance went even earlier than that. He looked almost exactly like he had that day on the bridge, left arm exposed and face covered by mask and goggles, leaving only a strip of skin on his right fingers and his forehead hand uncovered under his dark hair.

He stopped in the doorway, facing Steve, and Steve abruptly remembered the flash drive. He looked between the mechanism and Bucky, unsure what Bucky would do in this situation. There had been reports of the Soldier coming in now and then, but it was usually hard to tell what exactly he was doing. Steve didn't know what he needed to expect from this encounter. 

Bucky also didn't seem to know what to expect, given how long he stalled out in the doorway. "You shouldn't be here."

Steve raised an eyebrow. "'Here' in this room, or 'here' on this compound?" He eyed the process bar on the screen in front of him. 34%. He needed to buy time.

"Yes." Bucky replied mechanically, and Steve tried not to let it hurt his heart a little to hear his voice that flat. He stepped over the downed guard and further into the room. Steve braced himself, but Bucky didn’t come toward him, veering instead to the less sophisticated tech on the opposite side of the room. "Both. But this room specifically.” 

“Why this room, specifically?” Steve asked, eyeing the progression bar on the screen. It wasn’t moving as fast as he’d like, but it was moving. He was up to 48% now, he would probably need another two minutes at most. Bucky was intently looking over the older tech, angled away from Steve but not leaving his back exposed to him. 

“You shouldn’t be in here.” Bucky said, almost absently, and from his disconnected tone, Steve couldn’t tell if he was actually answering him or not. With his face still covered, there was no expression to go off of, but he’d come to a standstill in front of an old model of computer, just staring down at it. Steve watched him flex his gloved hand into a fist, release it, and flex again. “You should go.”

“Go?” Steve asked, brows furrowing. “Buck, what-”

He didn’t get the chance to finish the thought, because Bucky put his metal fist right through the monitor of the computer. Steve startled with an audible sound from the suddenness of it, bumping into another row of tables behind him. Bucky didn’t seem to notice, now deadset on dismantling the entire tech table in front of him. The act somehow perfectly balanced methodical precision and shocking brutality in a way Steve was very sure only the Winter Soldier could manage.

“Bucky, what the hell?” Steve asked, after having watched the display for several long moments, too confused to decide on an action. Now, he took a step forward before remembering the flash drive. It wouldn’t be good to let it out of his sights until it was done, but Bucky was already moving along, dismantling more and more of the tech in the room. He might have to try and stall him on the other side of the room until the download was done. 

63%. He had another forty-five seconds, at least.

Bucky ignored him, stabbing two metal fingers through the lock of a tall filing cabinet and ripping the drawers open. Steve watched him kick aside a table adjacent to the one the computer he was working at and start pulling files out as he went and tossing them into a pile on the floor. That bought Steve almost as much time as he needed, and he stepped forward, away from the table.

“Buck.” Steve stepped into his view, and Bucky lifted his face to meet him. Steve really wished he’d take off the mask, so that he could get some idea of what was happening in his head. As things were, Bucky was just standing frozen in place, still and robotic, files still in hand. Steve swallowed against the lump in his throat. “What are you doing?”

“You need to get out of this room, Steve.” Bucky monotoned. Steve still couldn’t get a read on his mindset, on what he saw in Steve. It was probably too optimistic to say he considered Steve a non-enemy, but he also wasn’t actively attacking him. That was probably a good sign, right? Maybe not, considering the way he was stepping towards Steve, now. “You shouldn’t be in here. You need to leave.”

“Buck-” Steve stopped at the chime coming from the computer, signaling that the download was finished. Right, he’d almost forgotten about that in his fixation on Bucky. He backtracked a few steps to grab the flash drive out of its port.

“Wait, don’t!-” Bucky shouted, advancing quickly with his hand outstretched. Steve had already pulled the drive, slipping it into his pocket as he retreated a step back, alarmed by Bucky’s sudden movement. 

Several things happened one right after the other.

The screen flashed away from the completed progress bar to a red warning display that sent an equal alarm ringing in Steve’s head.

Bucky closed the distance between them and took Steve by either shoulder in a harsh grip. On instinct, Steve raised his shield in response but hesitated just a moment too long to strike back. In the moment of hesitation, Bucky pivoted Steve bodily and shoved him with force Steve hadn’t been prepared for, sending him flying across the room.

Steve’s back hit a window, shattered through the glass, and kept the momentum. He didn’t even have time to grab for the wall, to stop himself as he was flung out the broken window into the open air. In the moment of sharp betrayal, time itself seemed to slow. 

Through the window, as he fell, Steve watched Bucky spin on his heel and take off further into the room. He’d hadn’t made it very far before fire suddenly exploded out of the computer Steve had just been using, spewing flame and metal in every direction. Steve only just had time to bring his shield over his face before the flame reached him and sent him flying even further.

There were several moments of time lost to the shock of the explosion and the ringing in his ears. By the time he came to his senses, he was on the concrete parking lot, leaned against a now-dented SUV. His head was pounding in a way that suggested a mild concussion, and his skin felt overheated and stinging where it was exposed by his suit. The world was still blurry around the edges, but his vision cleared enough for him to see the hot amber glow forming from the building ahead of him. 

He couldn’t tell now which window he’d been thrown from. There were at least half a dozen windows on that same floor that had had the glass blown out of them. The flames were still licking up out of the cracks the explosion had blown into the walls. It had to have been a hell of a blast to do that much damage.

Bucky was still inside.

“Fuck, Steve-!” Sam’s voice broke through the ringing in his ears, both on the comm, and in-person as Sam dropped out of the sky in front of him. Steve was struggling to his feet already, although he was less stable than he would have liked, and Sam put his hands on Steve’s arm to steady him. “Steve, are you-”

“Bucky’s in there.” Steve cut him off, sounding more dazed to his own ears than he’d have liked. He had to squeeze his eyes shut against the harsh throbbing in his skull, but he’d finished out a mission with a concussion plenty of time. He had to get to Bucky.

“I heard on the comms, man, but you can’t go back in there.” Sam pushed him back to lean against the SUV, standing this time. Steve tried to push him off, but he could barely manage it with the sudden sharp pain that shot through his shoulder. He must have landed on it wrong.

“I have to, Sam, he’s in there-” 

“Not anymore.” Natasha cut him off over both of their comms. “I’ve got eyes on him, Steve. He’s banged up but moving.”

“Nat!” Steve asked frantically, clutching at his earpiece. “Where are you? Can you stop him?”

“I can’t, no.” Natasha sounded clipped, and the rumble of an engine sounded distantly over the comms. “He’s got a motorcycle stashed around back, I’m not gonna be able to catch him in this. He’s moving though, Steve, he’ll be fine.”

“Thanks, Nat,” Sam said into his own comm. “Can you come and get us so we can get outta here before Captain Concussion gets any more of his eyebrows singed off?”

“Tall order, but I can manage.”

***

The soldier cut the engine off his bike before he’d even come to a full stop, bracing himself on his foot as he dropped the bike without bothering to open the kickstand. He’d be pissed about that tomorrow, he was sure, as the bike skidded on its side and slammed into the concrete wall of the parking garage. But at the moment, blood loss was a slightly more pressing concern.

He stumbled into the abandoned building he’d been using as a safe house, lighter now than when he’d left, seeing he’d lost his weapons at the compound. It didn’t matter, it wasn’t anything he couldn’t replace anyways. It would have been  _ nice _ if he didn’t have to, but it would have been  _ nice _ if Steve hadn’t been a dumbass and tripped the self destruct on the datahub. 

He had enough things stashed away in his safe house to take care of basic medical treatments, but he didn’t know what he was going to do if the damage was more substantial than what he could fix himself. He’d been fast enough thus far to avoid any major injuries (the occasional bullet wound aside), but he’d blanked out when he’d noticed what Steve was doing.

He shucked off his gear, leaving it in a sloppy trail from the hall to the room he’d taken up in. There was shrapnel still embedded in some of the kevlar of his suit, and it cut and dragged at his skin as he peeled each piece off. He managed to plop himself down at the table he kept his medic case on and began to assess the damage. He was dealing with about half a dozen lacerations at least, some burns of varying severity, and what felt like some shrapnel still stuck in his torso.

Okay. That wasn’t that bad. He could handle that on his own, no reason to panic. He didn’t need to seek outside help for that and risk being taken in again. He couldn’t afford to be taken in again. He had worked too hard to piece back the parts of himself that were lost under them, if they took him back he’d never be able to-

He stopped that line of thought in its tracks. It wouldn’t help anything. He just needed to breathe, to get himself under control. He wasn’t being taken anywhere, and he never would be. Drawing in a steadying breath, he took a sterilized pair of forceps from their packaging and began working on the shrapnel in his flesh shoulder.

The darkness swallowed up any noise he may have made.


End file.
